AIBU to feel really strongly about the new Cancer Research UK ad

[Gattasyl]

I keep hearing it on the radio and it's really starting to annoy the c*ap out of me. I think to keep putting the emphasis on cancer as a battle, as something you can win if you fight hard enough is just unfair and untrue and to be honest misleading.
This new one says 'so and so is a cancer fighter by night' because she's running the marathon...' I don't know... I find it really offensive towards people who have not 'beaten' the disease! AIBU??

YANBU. I can't bear race for life or all the pinkness of it all and the no men allowed. If it was role reversal there would be uproar. Also on the new ad its a man narrating/presenting it. So they get some "good looking" bloke to present it, get out attention and have lots of pink because that's all we are interested in???

Sadly, as many other posters have said, its not about being a battler. I know a woman who now has cancer for the 4th time. By the "battling" definition, she is a fighter, but its likely that this time the outcome will be the worst.

Its not about fighting, or battle or being strong, its about, in all honesty, luck of the draw: type of cancer, speed of diagnosis and treatment, postcode, availability (and now cost grrrrrrrrr) of medicines, age, existing conditions etc. But lucky dip isn't sexy or trendable on social media.

It used not to bother me but then I saw threads and posts about it, on here, later on FB, elsewhere and I understood the opinions of those who find it distasteful, upsetting, as though somehow their relative who died of it hadn't fought hard enough etc.

My Mum died of bowel cancer in 2007. There was no "battle" - she was never treated for it because they found it too late. She died because there was no other option for her.

I think the battle aspect has come from the way people saw their immune system as being their own inner army, and it has been used for other diseases too - HIV for one. There was a Guardian columnist, Oscar Moore, who wrote as PWA (Person With AIDS) and he considered his "fight" against AIDS as his way of trying to stave off the disease. He thought of his white cells as his soldiers, tried to visualise them fighting off the virus.

So I don't take so much issue with the battle aspect, because it makes sense to think of your immune system fighting off the disease, whatever it is - but I do understand the concept that people who die of whichever disease could be thought of as having not fought hard enough and am therefore disinclined to use the terminology to avoid offending anyone.

oh

yes,this is thought provoking

I ran London Marathon on sunday and really noticed how cancer research 'took over'.....there were at least 30 cheering points for the charity,most others had just 2!!

more cancer research vests.....just more of it in general. Then they have the race for life on top of it too

I think the baby is being thrown out with the bathwater here.

How can you really object to CRUK being massively successful in fielding so many marathon runners? Clearly although the ads don't resonate with many on here (and I totally agree the battle metaphor is inappropriate)- lots of people do feel empowered and want to take action, on behalf of others or for themselves, raising money for charity, for hospices and so on. Their ad is about fighting back by raising money for research- not actually fighting back in the context of having the disease, not quite the same thing and I didn't find the ad offensive for this reason (although when I saw it I knew lots would).

I also think that CRUK have done some amazing work over the years, I work in this area and I honestly believe without their input, we would not have had trials and now the roll-out of the bowel screening programme and the HPV vaccination. Their work on HPV on which my friend worked was nothing short of inspirational as there was a huge taboo about vaccinating young girls (I think boys should have it too) for a sexually transmitted virus. They challenged those connotations head on, did the research (with others) that shows its success, campaigned for it to be rolled out internationally, I am truly grateful for that and many many lives will have been saved by both prevention programmes.

I don't think this is another Marie Curie case at all (if you read the other thread about that charity), and although the organization isn't beyond reproach (it is correct it doesn't tend to focus on very rare cancers), to criticise it for raising so much money to combat cancer, I won't be criticising it for that, nope.

Mentioned this thread to a friend and she sent me this link from a cancer prevention charity. Interesting reading.

i HATE HATE HATE

i also hate this bullshit view that you can heal cancer by having certain vitamins/diet choices

cancer is strong, and it either spreads or it does not

Now of course the mental attitude you have will massively help the experience for you

but its a disease not a battle

they should know better

That advert is really offensive to me and a lot of others and some of the posts on here excusing it are too. The suggestion is that it doesn't matter if people find it offensive or distressing, it's all for the greater good. You know what? We all want to cure cancer, we just don't want to be patronised along the way. My husband died from cancer six weeks ago. He didn't 'give up the fight', he was murdered by cancer.

FromParis - maybe not heal, but certainly help to prevent with certain vitamins/diet choices. Vitamin D, for example. Scientifcally proven to help prevent e.g. bowel cancer, among other things.

Totally agree with you. However, I suspect the battle language helps people when they're first diagnosed. And it's probably effective in raising funds - which is why they keep using it.

The sadest thing for me is,all you seem to need is luck.

I agree. Luck is a far greater factor than any amount of "battling" or the assumption that you can beat cancer by battling it.

DH has always said that he's been remarkably lucky to get cancer somewhere that's treatable. Unlike the two friends of ours who died last year. DH won't survive his cancer let alone be cured - he's now on a palliative treatment regime for secondary cancer - but he's had two years (almost to the day) since diagnosis and he may well live for another year. Which in his view is mainly down to the luck of the draw. It's got nothing at all to do with 'positivity' or 'fighting' but everything to do with the sheer availability of treatment for his (well researched and funded) type of cancer.

I'm so sorry summerisle. My husband also had an 'easy to cure' cancer and was diagnosed two years ago on the 7th of March. He turned 54 on the 25th of Feb and died on the 18th of march. He died from prostate cancer.

So sorry to hear about your DH, Staywithme.

It really is horrible waiting for the inevitable over a period of years even though I respect my DH's view that he's been lucky.

So does anyone know a charity which does good research into underfunded areas of cancer research and doesn't waste money on offensive adverts and chuggers? I want to know who to give my money to!

I agree.

Beat cancer?

The ad seems to be made around the same framework as ads for the Territorial Army - it works for them, it does not work for cancer.

Cancer fighter by night....

Cancer may be an "enemy", but really, it is just a truly horrible disease.

I have (or have had) too many friends with cancer. It was not a fight for them. Just a question of trying to enjoy life and your children and spouse while undergoing harrowing treatment that made you feel shit.
My mum has cancer. She has had bone marrow cancer for 20 years, and had tumors operated out of her cervix last year. My mil has advanced bowel cancer. I now have yet another friend going through breast cancer that has spread after she was given the all clear.

it sort of implies that those who unfortunately don't survive, are somehow weaker. Exactly, and that is an insult to those who have died from this disease.

Also, it is too reminiscent of religious logic "If you believe enough, or pray hard enough, you will be cured" I hear it too many time in some circles, "he/she came to us with cancer, and her/his belief in God was so strong they were cured". WTF. It is exactly the same thing.

You will beat it if you fight hard enough, if you believe enough. Pisses me right off.

I have said it here before, but what fucked me off more was a couple of people who told my eldest son his dad would not die because there would be a miracle.

He had Lymphoma non Hodgkins for fours years, so many rounds of chemo and a bone marrow transplant but a few months after every treatment it came back. Rushed into hospital with a high temp and found the cancer had spread to all his organs and was told he had two weeks to two months to live. My son hung onto the words from those two people who said he wouldn't die because DRs get it wrong! When he died two weeks and one day later he was shocked because he had it in his head that I was wrong and the people who told him there would be a miracle were right. Of course he wanted to believe that he would live but I won't forgive them for giving him false hope.

I know someone else said they were going to email CRUK about this thread, but I've just done it too. I guess if they get it from several of us that'll make the point even more strongly.

No, not at all Kitty :)

As long as you don't go around telling other people their relative won't die then how you feel about about it is a personal matter.

Kitty my best friend has cancer and she also lives through hope

I take my hat off to her - truly whatever gets people through harrowing pain, surgery , waiting , chemo etc

One of the fittest, healthiest, bravest people I know had cancer. Someone whose who had spent their life putting their live on the line for others in the course of their work, someone not scared of the things most of us would be. If cancer really was a battle, I'd fancy their chances of winning.

But they didn't, they died. Not because they didn't battle, or keep hope alive where they could (the way they dealt with their illness was incredibly brave) but because they were just unlucky - they just happened to have a type of cancer that was incurable and no amount of fighting or hope was ever going to change it. A different type or in a different part of the body,it might have been different but where it was in the body meant it couldn't be operated on.

Luck is the most important thing in cancer, that and early intervention (and even that is down to whether you have the right type of cancer). Anything else is just what we tell ourselves to make it seem like we have some control over the situation - but the fact is, we don't.

So yes OP, I agree with you - it is incredibly offensive to those you have died and also minimises what is a terrible disease